“Thank God,” I exhaled.
He looked at me sharply. “Why do you say that?”
I rolled my eyes and went to the crockpot that was in the corner of my kitchen counter.
My kitchen wasn’t much to look at. White cabinets, white tiled counter, with a white tiled backsplash.
The floor was diner checkered black and white linoleum, and the appliances were basic white.
It looked awful, but at least it was clean.
Something that I’d had to work my ass off to accomplish when I’d first moved in.
“Probably because your sister’s hate my guts. Molly more than most. I was just thankful that Mikayla brought it. She’s too critical about her food to mess it up with poison,” I said as I reached for a bowl.
Cleo’s big body warmed my back as he effortlessly lifted his arm and brought down two bowls.
A normal sized one for me, and what amounted to a mixing bowl for him.
“They’re not that bad,” he admonished as he made himself at home, scooping up soup for the both of us, and then setting them on the table.
I followed behind him dutifully as I grabbed spoons, and sat down at the table.
“Whatever you say, Cleo-Patrick,” I said as I took my first spoonful of soup.
The liquid hit my tongue, bursting with flavor. However, when it hit my throat, it felt like shards of glass on the way down.
“Owww,” I whined.
He looked at me sympathetically. “You can take some more ibuprofen.”
I nodded, getting up to do just that.
I washed the pills down with a glass of milk, and sat down at the table again, studiously ignoring his probing gaze.
“I have to go to work in the morning. You’ll be okay?” He asked.
I looked up and shrugged. “Yeah.”
Picking his phone up off the table, he sent a quick text before sliding it back to the middle of the table and resuming eating his massive helping of soup.
“Were you hungry?” I asked with raised eyebrows.
“You have no food,” he said simply.
I snorted.
I didn’t. I hadn’t been to the store in a week. I’d taken my last salad, and then left it to rot in Cleo’s saddlebags.
“I haven’t been able to get to the store this week. No time,” I said by way of apology, before I started forcing myself to eat.
I stuck mainly to the broth, occasionally slurping down a noodle or two.
I kept my face down so he wouldn’t see the lie that had lit up my face. Cleo was a master at reading me, and I didn’t want him to ask questions and figure out my real reasons.
Mainly the one where he found out that I didn’t have the money to buy any food this week.
I picked up dinner with Nonnie during the week, when I got home it was a tie between a cheese sandwich and cereal most days.
“You have shitty cereal, too. I ate all that around four. I’ll go get you some more tomorrow,” he said just before upending the bowl and drinking the last dregs of his soup down.
My eyes started drooping again, but I didn’t want to go to sleep just yet.
I wanted to spend just a few more minutes in this lie.
I wanted to feel like I did a year ago.
Happy and content.
“Watch a movie with me?” I asked.
He stood and took our bowls to the sink. “Go get it on. I’ll grab your blanket off the bed.”
I complied with his instructions, and went to the couch and fired up my DVR.
I inserted the first Die Hard DVD, and sat in the very middle, giving him no other choice but to sit directly beside me.
Which he did thirty seconds later, wrapping the blanket around us both.
I curled around him, pushing until he was leaned back with his body length wise across the couch, and my body alongside his.
We’d been in this position many, many times.
So many times, in fact, that it felt like almost second nature.
I sighed as the movie started playing, and matched my breathing with Cleo’s.
Perfection.
That’s what it was.
In his arms, nothing in the world mattered.
The consequences were gone.
Our distance was gone.
What was left was just us. Cleo and Rue.
Chapter 6
It’s hard to be understanding when you’re surrounded by dumb motherfuckers.
-Tru’s secret thoughts
Rue
“Mmph-hello?” I answered the phone sitting next to my face.
“Hi, this is Dortea Annapolis.” The woman paused. “My secretary called you and set up an appointment time for this morning, however, you’re not here yet, and I wanted to double check to make sure we were supposed to meet.”
My eyes snapped open, and I groaned when I saw the clock. 10:33.
“Shit, I mean, shoot. I’m sorry. I’m sick. But I can still come if you need me to. I just need a couple of minutes to get dressed and get over there,” I croaked.
The woman made apologetic noises. “I’m sorry to hear that, dear. But the trial takes place next week, and I need your statement confirmed. We already have the arresting officer on the case here waiting. Basically, as long as you can get here, I don’t really care what illness you have .... as long as it’s not deadly.”
I groaned and sat up. “Okay, I’ll be there in,” I said glancing at my clock. “Fifteen minutes. I just have to find some pants.”
She chuckled, and we hung up.
I forwent my jeans for a nice pair of sweats, pulled on a hooded sweatshirt I’d stolen from Cleo, and went to the bathroom to brush my teeth.
My hair looked horrible, however there was nothing I could do with it besides taking a shower, so it was staying how it was.
I shuffled out of my bedroom and into the living room only to find a man sitting on my couch.
“What the fuck?” I asked him.
It was the same man who’d dropped me off from work a few days ago. The older one with the sexy salt and pepper hair. Oh, and that beard!
He was sitting on my couch with his feet propped up on the coffee table, watching bowling of all things.
“You look like shit,” he said eloquently.
“Thanks. Are you here to be my babysitter?” I asked.
He nodded and went back to the TV. “Everyone else was working. Lucky me. However, it beats the hell out of what I was going to do.”
I didn’t bother asking him what it was he was ‘going to do.’ He didn’t seem the type to be expounding on his answers.
“I have to go to the DA’s office. You coming with me or am I driving myself?” I asked.
“Do you need me to come with you? You look capable to me. I was just supposed to be here in case you started talking crazy again,” he said.
“What’s your name?” I finally asked.
I hadn’t yet ascertained his name due to his standoffish attitude. However, if he was going to be my babysitter, there was no reason I shouldn’t know his name since I'd already forgotten it from our first encounter.
“Silas,” he answered immediately.
Well, that wasn’t his full name or anything, but it was a name nonetheless.
“Well, Silas. I do believe I’ll use you. Thanks. I still feel a little weak in the knees,” I answered honestly.
My head was also pounding.
Thank God it was raining.
Otherwise, the sunshine would’ve absolutely killed me.
“You wearing that?” He asked as he stood.
“Yep,” I answered.
He shook his head and started walking to the door.
I could’ve sworn he said, ‘I don’t know what he sees in you’ but I could’ve just been hearing things.
We took his truck again, and I accidentally fell asleep.
“Rise and shine, buttercup. We’re here,” Silas’ voice woke me.
I blinked my eyes open slowly, and groaned
.
My body hurt.
“Thanks,” I muttered as I practically fell out of the truck.
He rolled his eyes and started walking knowingly through the front doors, waving to the on scene guard, and then walking forward to a bank of elevators in the very back.
“You’ve been here before?” I wondered.
He looked at me.
His blue eyes piercingly bright and knowing. “Yes.”
It made me wonder, but I wasn’t stupid enough to ask the question that was burning a hole in my brain.
He raised his brows, waiting for the inevitable question, but I’d be damned if I gave him that.
I narrowed my eyes and pressed my lips together, causing him to laugh.
The doors to the elevator opened and we walked in; I leaned against the side, already tired.
“You really do look like shit,” he observed dryly.
“Fuck off,” I grumbled.
He smiled and pressed the button for the third floor.
“So...how about them Saints?” I asked.
He chuckled. “I’m more of a hockey fan.”
Now why didn’t that surprise me?
“Which team?” I asked as the elevator doors opened and emitted us into a stuffy lobby with the walls decorated in off-white and beige.
“Red Wings. I’m from Detroit,” he answered as he led us down a hallway, and straight into the office of the woman I was meeting.
Color me surprised when I saw the DA and the very man I’d met yesterday at the drug store sitting in Dortea’s office.
“Silas? Rue, come sit down,” Dortea ordered.
I sat down into the seat, thankful that I was able to sit before I fell.
“How are you feeling?” Dortea asked.
I noticed Silas out of the corner of my eye move to take up position in the very corner of the room, propping his shoulder on the wall.
“I feel great.”
I’d tried for upbeat, but it came out sounding more like I was high on PCP more than anything, causing the man in the seat next to me, as well as Silas, to laugh.
“Well, okay then. Rue, this is Detective Rector. Rue Loden is the Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner who worked on Vanessa White’s case,” Dortea said to the detective.
I looked over at him through watery eyes and held up my hand in a salute to him. “Still sick.”
A smile kicked at the corner of his mouth. “I can see that.”
“Do you two know each other?” Dortea asked.
I shook my head. “I snotted all over his bike yesterday.”
Dortea let that sink in for a few moments before shaking her head slightly and looking back at the papers on her desk. “Noted,” she said as she sat forward in her chair. “Now, let’s get started. Detective, why don’t you tell us what you have, and from there we’ll move on to what Rue found.”
The detective nodded. “Vanessa White was found under the bleachers after a football game. She was the head varsity cheerleader, and she and her boyfriend were set to meet under there once he got changed. He was late, and another man found her under the bleachers where he raped her. Later, we found out that she set up this whole scenario so her boyfriend would catch the man, and they’d both be famous when he saved her. It didn’t work out that way, though, because the boyfriend never came, and when Vanessa realized it was getting too far, she told Brenden Newland ‘no.’ He didn’t stop. Brenden later left her there after he’d finished, and Vanessa took herself to the hospital.”
I remembered this story so well that I could recite each and every word.
What I hadn’t heard was Brendan’s side of the story.
“Brendan was brought in that night where he showed us the numerous emails between the two of them. Brendan said that they’d met on Craigslist. He told us that they planned the entire thing to the very last detail. Even the part where she’d tell him ‘no’ and he was to ignore her, because that was what she’d wanted. She’d never said anything about the boyfriend coming in to ‘save’ her, and they’d even met up the night before at a Starbuck’s to discuss what was going to happen the next night. Brendan is a dominant at a local BDSM club, and had been searching for a woman to do this with. Vanessa showed Brendan her fake ID, so the entire time Brendan assumed Vanessa was twenty one. Their computers records were subpoenaed and the surveillance from Starbuck’s was pulled. Everything Brendan said was true.”
At the time, Vanessa had been so distraught that I hadn’t realized just what was going on. The more Officer Rector explained, the more fucked up the entire thing became.
“What a clusterfuck,” Dortea said. “Either way this goes, they both lose. Rue, how about you tell us what you found.”
I shifted in my seat until I was leaning forward and started my story.
“I was called in on October 3rd to perform a rape kit on Vanessa White. I pulled out samples of hair, fibers, and skin from various parts of her body. She did have evident bruising along her vulva and vagina. The rapist had used a condom, so there were no bodily fluids from him, only a scant amount of blood from her. There was no ripping or tearing along the vaginal canal, and there were no defensive wounds on her body. She’d told me almost verbatim what Detective Rector just said, except she kept saying, ‘This was so not how I planned this’ over and over again. She was visibly distraught, as well as on the verge of non-compliant. She’d said throughout the entire interview that she should go. That maybe she shouldn’t ‘do this.’”
Dortea was running her fingers through the hair at her temples, Detective Rector’s lips were thinned, and I didn’t even bother looking at Silas. His face would reflect more of the same.
I was just as dumfounded as the rest of them.
“Dammit,” Dortea said. “I don’t like this case. Not one bit. Who’s the victim here?”
That was the million dollar question.
Chapter 7
A boy makes his girl jealous of other women. A man makes other women jealous of his girl.
-How to be a man
Cleo
“Want to go out to eat?” Loki asked me.
I looked over from the TV, downed my beer, and stood. “Sure.”
I was annoyed.
I didn’t know why I was annoyed, but I was.
It wasn’t like Rue owed me anything, but it still bothered the hell out of me that I didn’t know where she was.
I’d driven by her house as soon as I’d gotten off shift, and she was gone. I knew she wasn’t at work today because I’d transported two patients there, and each time I’d asked about her, they’d said she was gone.
My next stop had been the nursing home, but she hadn’t been there either.
Now, with nothing else to do, I was at the clubhouse drinking a beer with Loki.
He’d told me about the meeting he’d had with Rue three days ago, and now I was even more hyped up.
Something big stank about that case, but none of us could put a finger on what it was.
We both walked out to our bikes and drove into the night.
The weather was much warmer at sixty degrees, and it felt really nice out. A perfect night for a ride.
We ended up at Halligans and Handcuffs, the bar that was owned by The Dixie Wardens. It’d become a very popular attraction among the locals, and even garnered attention from the surrounding states, and a majority of the Ark-La-Tex.
The bar was located on the outskirts of Benton, the town where The Dixie Wardens MC called home, and about two minutes from my house.
We pulled into the bar and parked near the front, backing in among the member’s parking spaces in view of the front window.
I powered off the bike and kicked the stand down before standing up and stretching.
The bar was hopping.
“Lot of people here tonight,” I observed.
Loki nodded. “Been like this nearly every night this week. I would know and all since my wife’s decided that she now lives at her work.”
I snorted.
Channing was a hell of a woman. How she opened a business with a kid and a detective for a husband was beyond me.
Loki was beyond busy with work most nights and Channing had set the office up so she could take their baby to work with her if she needed to.
Starting a new business took a lot of work as well as dedication, and Channing had that in spades.
“Stop whining,” I said as we made it into the door.
We both waved at Tunnel Morrison, a police officer for Benton PD, and a fellow member of the Dixie Wardens, who was manning the door.
“If I can’t whine to you, who would I whine to?” Loki asked.
“How about your wife? Your best friend?” I asked.
Honestly, I was a bit of a loner. I liked being in the back of the room just watching what was going on around me.
I didn’t like talking, but when I did, you damn well better listen, because it was probably important.
I didn’t like large gatherings and being in a loud room made me nervous.
It’d only been four months since I was off full time duty with the PJ’s, and I was still a bit jumpy as a whole.
“You don’t like listening to my problems?” He joked.
“I don’t like listening to problems that have no basis on reality. If you don’t like it, fix it. If you can’t fix it, then find someone else who’ll stay with you at home,” I suggested.
Sometimes I came off as an asshole, but this world had a ton of problems that were of more consequence than a man’s wife not being at home when he wanted her to be.
That just made him sound like a whiney bitch.
“You’re such a dick,” Loki laughed.
I shrugged and went to the back corner of the bar and took a seat not in front of the bar, but behind the bar.
I really didn’t want to have to talk to anyone tonight; I wasn’t in the mood to be nice.
“Why do you always sit back here?” Loki asked as he took a seat on the opposite side of me.
He had his back to the room, and I could tell it was bothering him.
Police officers, and those in the military, had habits. Rule number one was knowing your surroundings. Rule number two, was never put your back to a room.
However, he had a mirror, so he was somewhat appeased.
Life to My Flight Page 6